The UP Express will soon become even more useful; it is finally being connected to the Bloor subway at Dundas Street.

Since its opening, riders wanting to connect to the subway have had to make an above-ground (and quite ugly) trek to the subway at the Dundas stop, or take the UPX down to Union. The owners of the Crossways plaza and apartment building will now have some property in the underground lot expropriated, and construction will take place starting in 2018, according to The Star.

Pedestrians and cyclists may be better protected if the province gets passes new bills this fall. Ontario will increase to $50,000 the fine for distracted and careless drivers who cause death, and the move is being lauded by the daughter of Gary Sim, a Mount Dennis man, whose killer faced a $500 fine.

Steven Del Duca said that the new penalties will “send a very clear message to justice and law enforcement” to charge more firmly. The driver who killed Sim was charged only with making an improper turn.

Heather Sim told Matt Galloway that “this is great news”. She said “I couldn’t imagine that you could kill somebody and [a $500 fine] is the maximum you could get…. This guy is just going to get two demerit points and go on as if nothing happened.”

Heather Sim also called for a vulnerable road user act that would differentiate between drivers who hit cars and those who hit pedestrians and cyclists. “A lot of drivers are on the road, and they see a cyclist and feel annoyance or frustration…. A lot of people look at it as if it’s supposed to be the cyclist who’s supposed to get out of the way”, she said.

Del Duca has also made driving high on marijuana more punishable, creating a zero-tolerance policy for young, new, and commercial drivers.

St John the Evangelist’s new school will not be open in time for September, according to Dave Bennett, the chair of the Parent Council.

The board snuck the news in as point 2 of a letter to the community, which, sandwiched between caissons and culverts, says that “Due to an administrative delay in issuing the conditional building permit, and an unusually wet summer, the schedule completion date have moved to mid-November 2018”.

The students at St John the Evangelist have put up with years—indeed decades—of disruption: a tiny school without enough outside space, many portables, moving to a school in the Junction, moving to a school north of Weston, and now this: a broken promise to have the school opened in time for 2018.

As reported here earlier this week, Metrolinx is looking at fuel cell technology to provide power for its trains (including UP Express) rather than the current polluting diesel or the already announced GO Train electrification using overhead catenary wires which will also power the Eglinton Crosstown.

Fuel cell technology has been in the news for decades but has yet to demonstrate its long vaunted potential. Hydrogen is the fuel and passes over cells combining with oxygen to directly produce electric power. Since only hydrogen and oxygen are involved, the exhaust is pure water. Companies like Ballard Power have been working on the idea for decades but difficulties include manufacturing the hydrogen (using purified water and electricity), transporting the highly flammable hydrogen gas safely to vehicles and installing fuelling stations where needed.

Exciting news out of Indiana yesterday should give the people at Metrolinx an alternative to fuel cells and catenary wires – battery technology. A battery powered bus has been able to travel 1700 km on a single charge. This rapidly improving technology is sufficiently advanced that it will provide emergency power from a site in Mount Dennis to the Eglinton Crosstown (instead of a generating station). Now it appears that batteries could be the solution to powering commuter transit.

The seven UP Express trains each travel under 900 km daily (it’s 24 km between Union and Pearson) and could charge for the 10 minutes each trip while they wait for passengers at either end. When the service stops between 1:00 am and 5:00 am daily, the trains could fully recharge using cheap electricity.

Fuel cells were partly, a response to poor battery technology. Now they appear to have been sidelined as battery storage continues to improve.

As measured, the total roadway space required for everything in the video is 56 feet. The current right of way along local roads such as Weston Road, Jane and Lawrence Avenue is at their narrowest, 27 metres or 88.6 feet. Unless I’m mistaken, this would allow the modifications shown in the video with a minimum of 16.3 feet feet for sidewalks on either side. Check out various rights of way on every major street in the city here. According to the video, traffic volume doesn’t suffer and cyclists are then able to operate in safety.